Methodist Church celebrates 40 years of women’s ordination

17 June 2014

This Saturday, the Methodist Church in Great Britain will
celebrate forty years of women's ordination.

Although women were permitted to become deacons in the Methodist
Church from 1890, they were not ordained as presbyters until 2
July, 1974, at the Methodist Conference in Bristol.

Three of the original seventeen ordinands - the Revd's Marjorie
Hopp, Elizabeth Hodgkiss and Jennifer Lunn - will participate in
the celebration, which will take place at Wesley's Chapel in London
on Saturday 21 June. All are welcome to attend and details of the
event can be found here.

"It was an honour to be one of the first," said the Revd Lunn, "and
I am grateful to the Barnsley Circuit who were delighted when there
were only seventeen and they got one!"

"Women have often been, and often are among the voiceless and the
unnamed," added the Revd Ruth Gee, President of the Methodist
Conference, who will be preaching at the service. "I am proud that
there is no role that women cannot play in the Methodist Church in
Britain. As one of their successors, I want to thank those women
who paved the way. As a female follower of Christ, I want to stand
alongside others who do not have a voice, who are unnamed and
unseen, even in the Methodist Church. We will celebrate, we will
give thanks and we will commit ourselves to the continuing journey
towards the time when we can truly affirm that all are one in
Christ. This is a celebration for the whole church."

A new hymn has been also been written for the occasion by the
Revd's Nicola Morrison and Michaela Youngson and will be led by a
choir brought together for this occasion.